History Main / HalfBreedDiscrimination

** Inverted in ''TabletopGame/{{Eberron}}'' with the Scar Enforcer Prestige Class, they're half-elf racists who go after both their ancestor species.

* In ''LightNovel/TheFamiliarOfZero'', the Elf Council shunned Tiffania and called her "unclean" for having a human father.

** ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'': In "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS4E21TheDrumhead The Drumhead]]", a supposedly quarter-Vulcan medical technician named Simon Tarses is interrogated about an incident aboard ship. During the interrogation, he is questioned about his enlistment and accused of lying about his parentage. Specifically, his paternal grandfather was not Vulcan (a Federation race) as he stated on the application but instead was ''Romulan'' (an enemy). Tarses is devastated because he fears this will end his career, even though Picard assures him that he is a good man.

** Witches are treated like this, even though they are a race of their own, being hunted by humans, and being shunned by monsters.

** Mikasa Ackerman had a white father and an Asian mother, and unfortunately, her Asian heritage was the reason they were targeted by human traffickers and her parents both killed due to the fact that Asians have almost entirely died out in the world setting. Mikasa was actually not considered as valuable as her mother due to her mixed heritage, but the traffickers settled for her after accidentally killing her mother.

*** This was {{Subverted}} with Towa, who was ironically Sesshomaru's daughter, the main reason being that she was raised by caring the Higurashi family.
*** However this is also the reason why Towa, Setsuna, and Moroha were kept in hiding from demons who would wish them harm, and specificialy from Zero, a {{Yandere}}, racist demon who became jealous of Izayoi earning the affections of Inuyasha and Sesshomaru's father. This is most notable with Setsuna, who was taken in by Shiori and was reluctant to explore the human world.

* ''Manga/Reborn2004'': Hayato Gokudera is half Italian, half Japanese, which lead to him being rejected by every mafia family except for the one headed by the almost totally Japanese Tsuna Sawada.
* ''Manga/RosarioPlusVampire'': Mostrels are hybrids of different monster races and are generally looked down upon for their mixed pedigree. They in turn despise the pureblooded monsters.

* ''Film/BladeTrilogy'': Natural-born vampires despise vampires who were "turned", seeing them either as upstarts who don't respect their traditions or outright {{Vampire Vannabe}}s. There's also a bit of elitism to this, since infected vampires outnumber the natural ones by a fair margin.

* ''Literature/{{Twilight}}'': [[spoiler:Renesmee -- Bella and Edward's child]]. The Volturi believe she's a child immortal, which is strictly forbidden by the Volturi, since said children would easily destroy a town with their lack of control over their thirst. Also, keeping up the Masquerade required the Volturi to kill the rest of the town. When they find that is NOT the case, they still want the child executed -- which is this trope.

Please note that in RealLife the terms half-breed and half-caste are highly offensive. "Mixed" is the most common everyday term, with "mixed-race" or "biracial" being used academically, but it varies by culture and individual.

** This is typical of how vampires are treated by demons. Vampires are demonic spirits that inhabit human corpses. They have many weaknesses, and demons are usually stronger than them. [[AuthorityEqualsAsskicking An evil demon often has many vampires as subordinates]]. Later, however, demons who are friends with vampires are not discriminated against. Harmony later also becomes a celebrity, and makes the vampires suddenly become the stars of the demon world.

* ''[[Fanfic/MyDeepestDarkestSecret My Deepest, Darkest Secret]]'': This is [[FurAgainstFang the main reason]] why Solon hides the fact that he's actually a werewolf-vampire hybrid from his brothers. His situation gets even more complicated when later chapters reveal that [[spoiler:hunters are looking for him, possibly so they can kill him]].

* ''Fanfic/MyDeepestDarkestSecret'': This is the main reason why Solon hides the fact that he's actually a werewolf-vampire hybrid from his brothers. Later chapters reveal that [[spoiler:hunters are looking for him so they can kill him]].

** Half-drow. Many of them choose to leave the culture of drow, and do good. But for the other races, they look in no way different from the drow. Among the drow they are despised again, because they have in half the "inferior" blood of another race. This does not apply universally as they are tolerated by Drow worshippers of Eilistraee (due to having rejected Lolth's culture along with having few non-Drow followers) and Dambrath (a kingdom ruled by half-Drows).

** ComicBook/{{Daken}}, Wolverine's son, is half-Canadian and half-Japanese. His named even means Mongrel. He grew up in Japan right after World War II had just ended. Considering how [[UsefulNotes/ImperialJapan the culture]] would be responding to an abandoned child of mixed descent at the time, his Jerkass nature becomes a little more understandable.

** Half-drow. Many of them choose to leave the culture of drow, and do good. But for the other races, they look in no way different from the drow. Among the drow they are despised again, because they have in half the "inferior" blood of another race. This does apply universally as they are tolerated by Drow worshippers of Eilistraee (due to having rejected Lolth's culture along with having few non-Drow followers) and Dambrath (a kingdom ruled by half-Drows).

** Half-drow. Many of them choose to leave the culture of drow, and do good. But for the other races, they look in no way different from the drow. Among the drow they are despised again, because they have in half the "inferior" blood of another race.

[[folder:Real Life]]
* Actress Jennifer Beals is biracial and was bullied in her black neighborhood in the 1970s. She also says that she has trouble finding roles because she is either [[ButNotTooBlack not white enough]] or [[ButNotTooWhite not black enough]]. For all her roles, she insists on the characters having the same racial background.
* According to some sources, Creator/BruceLee faced discrimination from his martial arts classmates due to the fact he was 1/4 German.
* Creator/HalleBerry suffered this for much of her early life in suburban Ohio in the 1970s and '80s.
* This was apparently often faced by the children of US servicemen born to Vietnamese women after the war. Many were sent to the US to be adopted because of it (Theatre/MissSaigon is an example). In fact, this caused a lot of problems among the servicemen since they are already married to white women (and have their own children) in the States.
* In Japan and Korea, there is still very much social stigma placed on people of mixed ancestry (especially towards those of mixed race between those two in specific, due to the larger racial enmity between them, which goes back even beyond WWII). Contrary to what many Westerners might think, Japanese and Korean people ''do'' look different if you look closely enough. One extreme example was the Japanese Emperor having to apologize in public because of his Korean ancestor - from ''800 years ago''.
* Real life is quite fickle with this trope. In one place, those of mixed-race descent are of higher status than those who are purely one race. An example is the Colorist system of the Caribbean, where those who [[ButNotTooBlack look "whiter" (or have a larger percentage of white ancestry)]] have higher social standing.
** It often depends on how each group 'counts' you, and what the rules are. These rules can range from the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-drop_rule one-drop rule]] and its relatives to mixes being recognized (which varies according to degree), and even strict [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matrilineality female]] or [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrilineality male]] lines. This trope can be a particular problem when the father comes from a group that follows the matrilineal and the mother's people are patrilineal...and then there's the issues caused when the mixed-race individual is seen as 'proof' of their parents' being {{category traitor}}s.
** There is also the factor that if both sides of the family were their respective nations' royalty or nobility it may be much less likely to be a problem, but not always.
** Drifts all over the place with Anglo-Indians in the Indian subcontinent. Those born to white mothers in mixed-race couples were typically given the "one drop rule" treatment while those born to British fathers occupied a special mid-tier between colonials and natives. After the 1857 sepoy mutiny, Anglo-Indians of patrilineal descent faced distrust from both sides and their opportunities became severely restricted. Post Independence, however, saw Anglo-Indian communities being given protected status in India’s equivalent of affirmative action.
* Jamaican singer Music/BobMarley was half-white and was bullied about this during his childhood.
* In his autobiography, UsefulNotes/MalcolmX mentions that his mother hated her light complexion to the point where part of the reason she married his father is because he was dark-skinned and would give her children some color and favored his siblings over him because he was light-skinned himself. Malcolm himself mentioned "hating every drop of white blood in me". Whether they each felt this way because of the color or because of how it came about -- [[ChildByRape Malcolm's grandmother was raped by a white man]] -- isn't clear.
* Mixed-race couples and their children were historically maligned in the U.S.[[note]]Lynching a black man for marrying a white woman was not unheard of, and depending on the time period, they might have gone as far as to lynch her and any children she might have had with him as well.[[/note]] to the point of it being illegal in many states for black people (or others such as Asians, in some cases) to marry a white person until '''1967'''. Also, since interracial romance and interracial sex were considered immoral, federal sex trafficking laws were routinely used to prosecute black men for being in consensual relationships with white women until the language was clarified to only apply to prostitution, sex slavery, statutory rape, rape, and pedophilia. The ChildOfTwoWorlds trope didn't come into play as often because a mixed-race child was more likely to be rejected by both parent groups instead of just one or the other.
* Creator/MeghanMarkle described going through this personally and professionally. Even now, white detractors of her marriage to [[UsefulNotes/TheBritishRoyalFamily Prince Harry]] make it clear that they still consider her black, as evidenced by the slurs leveled at them from the moment it was revealed that they were dating--including a neo-Nazi group deeming Harry a "race traitor" and calling for his assassination--while black detractors snidely suggest that the only reason she snagged him is because of how [[ButNotTooBlack light-skinned she is]] and that she would never have had a chance had she been darker or otherwise lack sympathy regarding the above-mentioned racism, insinuating that she deserves it for supposedly denying her African-American heritage--something she has ''never'' done. Their children weren't exempt from this either, with similar death threats and insults against ''them''--an especially low point was a radio host tweeting a picture of a ''chimpanzee'' with the caption "Royal Baby Leaves Hospital" shortly after their son Archie was born--and Harry revealing during the couple's notorious interview with Creator/OprahWinfrey that even a member of UsefulNotes/TheBritishRoyalFamily itself (who he refused to identify, only to emphasize that it was neither of his grandparents)[[note]] A late 2021 book alleged that it was his father, Prince Charles. [[/note]] had expressed "concerns" as to what their skin tone would be.
* ''Film/CrazyRichAsians'' star Creator/HenryGolding has gone through this, lamenting that he's had to deal with white people mistreating him for being half-Asian and Asian people mistreating him for being half-white. In fact, some people criticized his casting in the film for the latter reason.
* Mixed ancestry isn't strictly necessary to be considered a "half-breed." Even pure-blooded immigrants (or their descendants) who refuse to ghettoize tend to end up shunned by a significant portion of the culture they came from and the culture they've adopted. Simply being born to a couple of mixed ''cultural'' ancestry (but the same race) can result in prejudice.
* Roman general Flavius Stilicho (who was considered one of the most powerful men during the last days of Rome) was the son of a Vandal father and a Roman mother. Despite his mixed heritage, there is little to suggest that he identified himself as anything other than Roman and a Christian as Christianity was the state religion of the Roman Empire at that point in contrast to the Vandals that practiced German paganism or Arianism, but that didn't stop his political rivals from accusing him of duplicity. In fact, this is one of the reasons that led to his downfall as his military failures against Vandals were viewed as him working with enemies against Rome, leading to Stilicho's execution.
* Comedian and host of Series/TheDailyShow, Creator/TrevorNoah, experienced this in his childhood. He's spoken and [[Literature/BornaCrime written about]] how his Xhosa mother and Swiss father's relationship had to be kept a secret, because during apartheid in South Africa it was illegal to be in an interracial relationship, though Trevor notes that his mother would've gotten a worse punishment than his father. Then Trevor was born, and he remembers how both Afrikaners and Black Africans would think of him as "half-caste", "mixed-breed", or even a "mutt". One of the things he remembers is that if he was walking down the street with his parents, he and his mother would walk on one side of the road and his father on the other. His mother would also have to avoid holding his hand in public in fear that a policeman would suspect something. Trevor's mere existence was dangerous, because if the white police noticed that he was mixed race, they would realize that his mother had an illegal relationship with his father.
[[/folder]]

* ''Literature/TheCityOfBrass'': "''Shafit''" human-daeva hybrids are second-class citizens in [[OurGeniesAreDifferent daeva]] society, facing limited legal rights and arbitrary government persecution. An earlier dynasty conducted mass murders of ''shafit'' in the belief that any human-daeva intermingling [[GodIsDispleased threatened divine retribution]]; the current dynasty simply wants to keep them down because they reproduce much faster than pure daeva and threaten to outnumber them.

* ''Literature/EarthsChildren'': This often happens to those born of mixed Neanderthal and Cro-Magnon heritage (called "children of mixed spirits" in the novels). The Neanderthals consider them "deformed" and almost invariably cast them out at birth and the Cro-Magnons disparagingly refer to them as "animals" and "abominations".

* In ''LightNovel/TheFamiliarOfZero'', the Elf Council shunned Tiffania and called her "unclean" for having a human father.

* ''LightNovel/OutbreakCompany'': While elves and other nonhuman races experience some discrimination, it's far less than that experienced by half-elves. Both elves and humans view them with extreme prejudice bordering on disgust.

* In ''LightNovel/ReZero'', half-elves experience extreme prejudice and fear. This fear is only heightened by the fact that Satella, the Witch of Envy that once threatened the entire world, was a half-elf. Main character Emilia experiences this prejudice to the maximum extent, since with her white hair and other features she's a perfect match for Satella's description.

** Tieflings -- the descendants of humanoids and fiends -- are treated very poorly in most nations, and rarely enjoy better treatment from fiends. The people of Cheliax routinely summon and bind devils, but see this relationship as strictly one of master and servant -- and so do the devils, although they have different ideas as to who has what role; consequently, both sides see tieflings as essentially the result of someone being indiscreet with the maid. Tieflings in the demon-infested Worldwound fare little better, as humanoids see them as a reminder of their fate and demons as mortal cattle like the rest.

* ''VideoGame/NeverwinterNights2'': In ''Mask of the Betrayer'', Hagspawn tend to get a poor welcome from both sides of their heritage; humans shun them for being ugly brutes spawned from monsters, while hags are just [[AlwaysChaoticEvil evil in general]] and don't grant exceptions to their offspring (especially offspring with none of their magical talent). Gannayev, your hagspawn, gets the extra bonus of being disliked even by other ''hagspawn'', as [[MySpeciesDothProtestTooMuch he has little in common with them both in appearance and demeanor.]] Human girls like him though. Much to the ire of their fathers.

** [[spoiler: Reiner Braun is actually half-Eldian and half-Marleyan]]. Laws prohibiting such relationships result in him concealing his true heritage and give him '''plenty''' of Daddy Issues as a result of never being permitted to meet his father.
* ''Manga/{{Basilisk}}'': [[spoiler: Tenzen]], though this comes off only in the anime. He's the product of a union between members of feuding Ninja clans hims, and his Iga mother was killed by his Koga father. He was cut from his mother's womb to be raised as a Koga. He later on defects to the Iga as part of a scheme to revenge himself on both groups by [[LetsYouAndHimFight playing on their hatred for each other]].

* ''Manga/BlueRamun'': It is forbidden for members of the Blue Ramun tribe of the Silkdeep Empire to marry outside of their ethnic group and doubly forbidden for them to produce children with civilians. The children of such unions have a weakened version of their Blue Ramun parent's [[HealingHands healing]] [[ThePowerOfBlood abilities]], but not enough to train or work as full fledged Blue Doctors. [[spoiler: [[FantasticTerrorists The Garicalege]] preys on these "illegal" children because their disappearances can't be reported without the parents admitting to the crime of conceiving a half-blooded child. When Jessie and Eagle rescue a young half-Blue Ramun girl from the Garicalege, Eagle uses his connections to have the her sent North to the land of Seldia where there isn't legal prejudice against half-Blue Ramun kids.]]

*** This was {{Subverted}} to Towa who was ironically Sesshomaru's daughter, the main reason being that she was raised by the Higurashi family.
*** However this is also the reason why Towa, Setsuna, and Moroha were kept in hiding due to the fact that their separation was caused by a {{Yandere}} racist demon named Zero who became jealous of Izayoi earning the affections of Inuyasha and Sesshomaru's father. This is most notable with Setsuna who was taken in by Shiori and was reluctant to explore the human world.

* In ''Manga/NegimaMagisterNegiMagi'', both Half-Demons Kotaro and [[spoiler: Setsuna]] mention having problems fitting into either the Human or Demon world. [[spoiler: Setsuna]] doubly so as her demon family considers her [[spoiler: albinism]] to be taboo so she has to dye her hair to a more acceptable darker tone.

* ''Manga/PetShopOfHorrors'': In one story, a Filipino woman marries a much older Japanese man and has a son with him. When her husband has a stroke and begins to suffer from dementia, the rest of his family makes no secret of how they think a mixed-race child is not fit to inherit and that the man's pure-blood Japanese grandson is a much better choice as a successor. Given that the family is shown as being ''incredibly'' dysfunctional (notably the grandson is selfish [[spoiler: and kills his grandfather to please his mother]] while the mixed-race son is polite and kind), the story is firmly on the side of the Filipino woman and her son. D gives the woman a young man to help as a caretaker for her husband, who tells how he himself is biracial and was unable to fit in with his mother and father's homelands. [[spoiler: The end of the story reveals that the man was actually a dog that was a mixed breed but very loyal and loving. Oh, and it turned out the man had been faking his dementia and ensured that his mixed-race son inherited everything, now that he saw how despicable the rest of the family was.]]

* Blue from ''Anime/WolfsRain'' is a wolf-dog. Upon meeting Cheza, the dog side of her virtually disappears and she joins the other wolves. In the end, [[spoiler: it ultimately causes her to be denied reincarnation and she can't be with the other wolves.]]

** ''ComicBook/YoungAvengers'': [[spoiler: Hulkling]] is half-Kree, half-Skrull. His Skrull grandfather even ordered his death, though now the Skrull Empire wants him back, as he's the only living member of the Imperial family. And the Kree would rather he join their ranks instead. The kicker? [[spoiler: He considers himself more human than either Kree or Skrull due to being raised as one, and doesn't want to join ''either'' group.]]

* ''Fanfic/BreathOfTheWild'': This is a novelization of the [[Videogame/TheLegendOfZeldaBreathOfTheWild game of the same name]]. There's an OriginalCharacter named Lochlia, a Zora-Hylian hybrid girl. When Link meets her, she tells him that the people would give her dirty looks as her Hylian features became more and more apparent, and it really left a mark on her. It's especially sad, because [[spoiler: she's actually the Zora Princess, the daughter of Princess Mipha and Link from a prior relationship they had. As Mipha's daughter, she inherited her mother's healing gift, and even ''that'' wasn't enough to placate the bigotry of her people. This left Lochlia taking a massive reckless risk to finally prove herself to her subjects.]]

* ''Fanfic/MyDeepestDarkestSecret'': This is the main reason why Solon hides the fact that he's actually a werewolf-vampire hybrid from his brothers. Later chapters reveal that [[spoiler: hunters are looking for him so they can kill him]].

* ''Fanfic/{{Sisterhood}}'': Akira reveals that she was the only child of mixed race at her school and got picked on as a result. [[spoiler: Fear of this persisting was the deciding factor in a LOT of decisions Lilly's parents made.]]

* ''Film/Aquaman2018'': All of the Atlanteans except [[MentorArchetype Vulko]] and [[MissingMom Atlanna]] openly look down on Arthur for his half-human heritage, although Mera eventually gets better after spending enough time with him. [[spoiler: Even the Karathen, the sea monster guarding Atlan's trident, expresses her disapproval for his half-breed nature, until he reveals that [[SpeaksFluentAnimal he can hear her]].]]

* ''Literature/{{Kire}}'': Flora is half-[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hulder hulder]], half-[[spoiler: [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neck_%28water_spirit%29 nøkk]] ]], which makes her discriminated among the magical creature society, mostly because only [[OurElvesAreDifferent elves]] are allowed to [[InterspeciesRomance interbreed]]. Most humans who see her also see her mostly as a [[spoiler: nøkk]] which scares them.

* ''Literature/ShadowsOfTheApt'': Half Breeds are treated as an inferior class by all other races (despite many of the different kinden living in peace with strong interracial friendships and couplings). However all the mixed characters we meet are either already being used for their blend of abilities or eventually rise above their racist superiors: Totho [[spoiler: is recruited by the Wasp military engineer Dariandrephos (another Half Breed who outshone his peers) who recognises his talent for designing weapons.]] Also [[spoiler: Tisamon's Half Breed daughter is a mix of the two most rivaled races Spider and Mantis. Unsurprisingly she also becomes grudgingly accepted among the Mantis kinden for her talent as a Weaponsmaster.]]

* ''Series/{{Farscape}}'' plays the trope straight with Jothee, D'Argo's half Luxan-half Sebacean son, given the extreme adherence Peacekeepers have to keeping the Sebacean bloodlines pure. The trope is subverted with Scorpius, as he manages to become a very high-ranking Peacekeeper despite the fact that he's A) a half-breed and B) the other half is Scarran, the Peacekeepers' biggest enemies. Played straight with Scorpius's upbringing amongst the Scarrans, though; most of his childhood was spent being forced to cleanse himself of "Sebacean weakness" and prove himself worthy of being considered a Scarran- up until he stabbed his caretaker's eyes out with a coolant rod. [[spoiler: He is also later revealed to be a faux-spy for the Scarran leader, so he somehow managed to insinuate himself into the ranks of both halves despite their hatred of each other.]]

* ''Series/TheWitcher2019'': After it's revealed Yennefer has a quarter elven blood, she is denied a post as {{court mage}} to a king. [[spoiler: She has to go around the Brotherhood's back to get the position, and in retaliation is kicked out of the Brotherhood before she even officially joined.]]

** In ''VideoGame/FireEmblemPathOfRadiance'' and ''[[VideoGame/FireEmblemRadiantDawn Radiant Dawn]]'', the Branded, those with both laguz and beorc blood, are subject to discrimination by both races, consummation of such an InterspeciesRomance being a "crime against the goddess". It is revealed late in ''Radiant Dawn'' that [[spoiler: when a child is born to such parents, the laguz parent loses the ability to transform, and becomes something belonging to neither species. This was discovered roughly eight-hundred years earlier when Altina gave birth to a child fathered by Lehran; the first beorc-laguz hybrid ever. Before the birth, everyone was excited because it seemed like the ultimate proof of the new peace between the two races. Then Lehran lost all of his powers after the child's birth, everybody panicked thinking that a new race war would result from laguz fears of being breeded out, and such unions were outlawed, [[NiceJobBreakingItHero which increased tensions and ensured continuous violence between the two sides for centuries more]].]]